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Murder of Jeffrey’s Bay butcher Deon Verwey: trial May 2 2012

The murder trial for the suspects arrested for the murder of Jeffrey's Bay butcher Deon Verwey starts on 2 May 2012.

Mr Verwey, right, was murdered on June 14 2009 in Wavecrest, Jeffrey’s Bay. He was attacked, tied up and murdered by someone who broke into his home and stabbed him in the heart with a screwdriver, said his sister Annetta van der Merwe at the time. He had just recently sold the Graslaagte butchery he’d owned in nearby Humansdorp. Apparent from the blood-trail in the house, police said at the time that appeared as if the injured Mr Verwey had struggled from the living room to the rear door where he managed to call to his sister, living next door, for help – even though he was tied up with a telephone cable. Police Insp. Marianette Olivier and called on the public to phone the investigating officer, at telephone 042 200 6833. His sister Mrs van der Merwe, who lived next door to Mr Verwey at the same site, told the news media her friend J H Potgieter woke up when he heard her brother call out for his sister, shouting “Netta, help!’ Her friend went to the house, looked through the window and saw her injured brother bent over at the window. He feared that the attacker was still in the house so he grabbed a garden shovel and rushed over. “By that time my brother was sitting on a chair, and was calling for me to bring the car to take him to hospital’. However her brother died enroute in the car and was declared dead on arrival at the Humansdorp hospital. “In February we still were so shocked about the cruel murder on Mrs Cecile Potgieter (on Feb 20 2009), and little did we know that my brother would be next,” she said. http://jv.dieburger.com//Stories/Streek/OosKaap/19.0.1622973553.aspx---------

February 20, 2009: Businesswoman Cecile Potgieter murdered in Jeffrey’s Bay Mrs Cecile Potgieter, 51, a local businesswoman, was murdered on February 20 2009. She was bludgeoned to death after she was already seriously injured from torture-stab wounds. She was tortured to force her into transferring R10,000 from her bank account to a post-office savings account which was in the name of her now convicted killer, Franklin Stuurman, 24, a local gardener. The second defendant was a 16-year-old girl, his girlfriend, whose trial was split from his in October 2009 in the Port Elizabeth High Court. The16-year-old girl was also convicted for the role she played in Mrs Potgieter’s horrific death. http://censorbugbear-reports.blogspot.com/2009/09/cecile-potgieter-humansdorp.html

Jeffrey’s Bay not nearly as safe as the tourist brochures claim. -- Jeffrey’s Bay, is world-famous as the world's ‘surfer’s paradise, the South African town featured as the beach-resort with the longest wave in the cult-surfing movie "An Endless Summer". More than half its residents are owners of second holiday-homes who only occupy them during the holiday seasons. And they let their guard down on holiday. Yet, as these two murders above of two Jeffrey’s Bay business leaders have shown, the peaceful-looking, stunning seaside scenery hides a community which is increasingly being plunged into criminal gang violence – exactly as is happening in the rest of South Africa. SAPS

Many people who go on vacation let down their guard at beach resorts like this, yet many families are frequently targetted by crime gangs who break into their cottages, rob, assault, often rape and kill them. And Jeffrey’s Bay holiday-makers who want to have a fun night out at the nearby Port Elizabeth casino also better be careful – it may be a glamorous fun venue but it also draws the big money, and hence has become a drawing card for criminal gangs. Theuns and Suzann Potgieter of Jeffrey’s Bay also wanted to have such a fun night out at the casino when six armed men burst in while the couple were gambling inside with thousands of others – and the crowd fled in panic when hearing the shots as the gang attacked. The couple was lucky to make their escape they said: one of the gang members, the now convicted Lovemore Dube, 28, took three staff members hostage after he became trapped in a cashier‘s office when the door slammed shut – and he eventually surrended. CCTV footage later revealed that the other five men made their escape right in the middle of the fleeing crowds as the casino was being evacuated…http://www.mykouga.co.za/crime/they-didn%E2%80%99t-gambleEven Jeffrey’s Bay post office was targetted by armed gangs several years ago: four armed men held all the customers and staff hostage and looted them. They got away with an unknown amount of cash and cellphones. http://www.sandkasteel.co.za/JeffreysBay.htm-----------------

Residents are fighting back against crime However, its residents are fighting back, recently setting up the Jeffrey’s Bay Community Police Forum, with its members warning that people must ‘thinking of Jeffrey’s Bay as a peaceful fisherman’s village…’ Renowned Jeffreys Bay artist Stephen Bibb joined the war against crime by donating one of his paintings (below_ to an individual or an organization that has signed up as a member by the end of June 2009. “Safety and security is an extremely emotive issue in this country, it is time that we all started coming together as communities and taking back the streets from this scourge that is sucking the life from this land” said Bibb, who is well known for his surf art. The artist urged people to join up with the CPF . “We are realizing very swiftly that the only way to stand up against these cowardly gangsters and brutal thugs, who prey on the decent and largely defenceless public, relying largely on our fear and our apathy, is to become involved in defending our communities in any way that we can”. “By joining the CPF and getting on the mailing list that’ll keep you up to date on what’s really happening in your community in the fight against crime.Becoming more vigilant and security-conscious, all of us will be contributing to the solution and helping the dedicated men and women who make our town and ultimately our country a safe place for all of us”. Check out Stephen’s art at his website at http://www.stephenbibba

The term "genocide" was coined by legal scholar Raphael Lemkin in 1943, writing:

'Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actionsaiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves.

The objectives of such a plan would be the disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of personal security, liberty, health, dignity and lives of the members of such groups... '